Peter Molyneux: He's a bit like a film director - he deals with an idea, and thinks about everything from gameplay to reviewing the cinematics and graphics. He can communicate to a big team, and is incredibly patient. You can have an idea, and have to wait a year before anything happens, and then another two before you start working on the idea.

TG: Why game design?

PM: I think it's the excitement of having an idea, and feeling it will come to virtual reality. It's like you have a dream, and you can touch that dream, and there aren't many jobs in which you can do that. You can have the weirdest idea, and come into the office, and say, "I have a good idea," and that's going to cause lots of hard work for lots of people. It's a big responsibility.

TG: When you are designing, which comes first: content or mechanics?

PM: The first thing is an idea, but it works several ways, because sometimes it's, "Oh, wouldn't it be cool to make a game about the movies?" and then you think, "Well, that's great, but what do you actually do in the game?" Sometimes, it's "Wow, that's a really good idea for a mechanic. Would that fit into a game?"

TG: Can you give an example of the latter?

PM: It happened quite a bit with Fable, in that we had "morphing" and "changing" mechanics. Fitting that into the game - that was the first thought. "If you could be a hero, what would you do?" And that was much more important than the story.

TG: Your games have covered everything from theme-park management to keeping monsters happy in a dungeon, but have there been any constant themes?

PM: Using simulation in different areas. The first, Populous [Bullfrog, 1989], which was very primitive, was a simulation of a city, Theme Park [Bullfrog, 1994] was a simulation of a theme park, and Dungeon Keeper [Bullfrog, 1997] was a simulation of a dungeon. Simulation - and wanting to make it more sophisticated and "real" each time - is probably the common thread.

TG: It's been said you give a "human" edge to strategy games, mainly by clever use of artificial intelligence.

PM: I think that's true. I love strategy games, but a lot are very techy, and they don't really give you any human side of what strategy really is.

TG: Some of your games - Fable and Black & White - feature the concept of "good" versus "evil". Do you want to expand beyond that understanding of morality to something more Eastern?

PM: One thing I want to explore is the idea of choice. One of the most black and white choices is between good and evil. But it would be nice if those choices were more subtle than the basic "good and evil" ones. It may be you're a really nice person, but you're a bit gnarly and hard to get on with. Or you could be a hero, but a bully. Those subtleties are interesting. In Dungeons & Dragons, as in Eastern philosophy, you can be "Chaotic Good", where you can be good, but cause total chaos.

TG: Has your approach to game design changed over the years?

PM: Radically. The major change was going from Black & White to Fable, because I was no longer programming, and I had spent most of my time designing through programming, and only working with people I knew well. Before that, I was the only programmer on a project, as with Populous, Populous II and Powermonger. That has changed dramatically. As a single person, you can do anything. When you have 70 people, you haven't time to program; you have to explain things and sell the vision in your head.

TG: Does that make you feel powerless?

PM: A lot of the time, you're challenged. People don't accept everything you say. It's not powerlessness. It's more a case of: "I have this idea, but I'm going to have to explain it well and say why it's important." The No 1 flaw is saying: "I know it's going to be fine. Just do it." Never expect people to sit around and say: "OK, I'll spend the next 20 hours here and not see my family because you've had a great idea."

TG: Are there any areas where you feel freer?

PM: Things like engine technology used to be hugely restrictive. You couldn't have more than one baddie on screen, you couldn't have more than three arrows firing at once. Now, you can say, "I want 20 monsters, and 30 weapons," and there isn't a technical string attached. That's a good and bad thing, though - you have a wider palette to work with, and that does not necessarily make you think better.

TG: What makes games difficult? Is it a confusing interface, or ...

PM: It's a confusing interface, it's the pacing. As game designers, we often assume people are playing from start to finish, and they're never going to walk away from it. But people are doing that. One of the hardest things for us is getting a player to sit in front of something they've played hundreds of times, and have them think, "Oh, I'm playing this for the first time."

TG: Is that a goal for Lionhead?

PM: Yeah. It's a very difficult balance. Fable was a perfect example - a lot of people said, "Oh, this is too easy." And they were the role-playing or action gamers. But a lot of people who hadn't played those sorts of games said, "Ooh, this is a bit too hard." That's a hard balance to get right.

TG: So people shouldn't need skill to play a game?

PM: No, you should need skill to do well, but not to play a game. You should be able to get enjoyment out of it. If you've paid $100 (£60) for a game and can't get past the first hour, you're going to feel pissed off. Maybe it takes you three times longer, and you don't get the cool stuff skilled people get but you should be able to finish.

TG: Do you have any game design heroes?

PM: The Ico, Halo and Call of Duty teams, Will Wright and Shigeru Miyamoto. There aren't as many new names around, which is frightening. The main reason is that "teams" do things now.

TG: Yet you're still regarded as a "rockstar" game designer.

PM: The thing that worries me about being a "named" game designer is there aren't any new designers popping their heads up. I mean, everybody's going to get pretty sick of us as we fade into our 50s.

TG: Why aren't new names popping up?

PM: Two reasons. Publishers don't like promoting individuals, because they can up and leave. Second, being a designer is just one part of a game. It is more like a film director than ever. Some films are made brilliant by their directors, some are ruined by them, and some are great because the crew works together. There's no one designer on the games we do - sometimes I lead a team of seven. It is a collaborative effort.

TG: Does being on this pedestal make you uncomfortable?

PM: It makes me incredibly proud. And I still can't believe I'm talking to you about games I wrote. It does feels slightly wrong that it's just me, though. If there were a way for you to talk to every single person at Lionhead, that would be brilliant. But I'd rather be a spokesman for all those people than not have a spokesperson at all.

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